Exploring visual journalism

Spain

“Bread Procession of the Saint” honors Domingo de La Calzada Saint (1019-1109) in Santo Domingo de La Calzada, northern Spain. Every year during spring season, “Las Doncellas,” or “White Virgins,” hold baskets covered with white cloth on their heads while they walk past the old village in honor of the saint.More

Armed with turnips, hundreds arrive in Piornal, Spain every year on Saint Sebastian Day to hurl the root vegetable at the Jarramplas, a man dressed as a demon. The centuries-old Jarramplas Festival takes place annually every January 19-20, and this year they expect to use more than 20 thousand kilograms of turnips. Though its origins are unclear, the festival is generally believed to symbolize the expulsion of everything bad.

The La Vijanera masquerade, of pre-Roman origin, took place in the small village of Silio, northern Spain, on Sunday. It is the first carnival of the year in Europe symbolizing the triumph of good over evil and involving the participation of crowds of residents wearing different masks, animal skins and brightly colored clothing. The festival has its own complex function and symbolism in becoming the living example of the survival of archaic cults to nature.More

Ahead of the 40th anniversary of Francisco Franco’s death, historians are working to demolish the myths that the Spanish dictator himself had created by constantly rewriting history. Franco ordered that the Belchite ruins be left untouched as a “living” monument of war.